


it goes both ways

by delta_trevino



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Aftermath of Accidents, Alternate Universe - Military, Angst and Tragedy, Confessions, M/M, Weddings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-07
Updated: 2020-07-15
Packaged: 2021-03-05 04:01:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,793
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25118077
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/delta_trevino/pseuds/delta_trevino
Summary: “Keiji.” Akaashi requested softly. “Call me Keiji.”“Keiji,” Bokuto whispered. He knew what Akaashi had been thinking.“Bokuto-san-”“Koutarou,” Bokuto said firmly. “Goes both ways, right?”“Okay,” Akaashi swallowed. “Koutarou.”Bokuto thumbed another tear away. “Yes, love?”Love. Another tear fell from Akaashi’s eyes.A short in which Akaashi and Bokuto find themselves in a high pressure situation, and still very much in love.
Relationships: Akaashi Keiji/Bokuto Koutarou
Comments: 9
Kudos: 66





	1. Prologue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi readers!
> 
> Scales of Intensity:  
> Angst: 7.5/10  
> Fluff: 8.5/10  
> Lime/Lemon: 2/10

"Bo - to - stop," Akaashi was laughing, almost crying, as Bokuto tickled him ruthlessly.

"Hmmm? I can't hear you," the lieutenant replied, grinning over him. Akaashi managed to push Bokuto's hands away from his hips for a second, giving Akaashi a second to gasp air.

"Stop!" Akaashi said between gasps, sitting up again. He was way too ticklish for his own good.

"Mmkay," Bokuto pressed a pliant kiss onto Akaashi's lips. Akaashi loved military days off with Bokuto. He had waited for Bokuto's to come around and instead of going into town like everyone else, they were spending the day on top of a grassy hill. Sun rays made Akaashi squint into the field, only a thirty-minute walk away from their base.

"I didn't know you were so ticklish." Bokuto poked Akaashi's side. Akaashi squirmed, swatting Bokuto's hand.

"I am."

"Clearly," Bokuto laughed, poking him again.

"Stop, stop," Akaashi giggled. "Please no."

In response, Bokuto threw himself on to his back, lying down on the hill. Akaashi watched his now five-year boyfriend sink into the grass. They'd been long-distance when Bokuto had first joined the forces, who had patiently waited for Akaashi to join after finishing his school. Practice and the regimes were gruelling but it was worth seeing Bokuto. Akaashi's sides hurt from laughing, but he flopped down and nestled into Bokuto's side. A hand drifted up to play with his hair.

"Kaashi?" Bokuto asked hopefully.

"Yes Bokuto-san?" Akaashi fiddled with a dandelion on the ground.

"Wanna come on this small mission with me? It's part of Project Comm, just to test the new communication settings in between submarines. We'd be going in one for an hour or two next week. Should be quick."

Akaashi hummed. "Sure. The ones that mimic echolocation?"

"Yeah." Akaashi could hear the smile in Bokuto's voice. "Like those whales you told me about!"

"The toothed whales and dolphins," Akaashi recalled.

"And the humpbacks and blue whales."

"Well, scientists aren't too sure about that. They use songs."

"Like you!" Bokuto noted. Akaashi nodded at his boyfriend's dorkiness. Bokuto was overenthusiastic of Akaashi's singing after he tumbled upon Akaashi singing in the library in high school, saying it was the best thing he had ever heard. And seven years later Bokuto was still asking Akaashi to sing to him whenever they had a moment alone. And after some coaxing, Akaashi always did.

"Like me." Akaashi agreed. He teased Bokuto lightly. "You need to sing too so we can communicate like the whales, since it goes both ways."

Bokuto zipped his lips up together like a little kid, shaking his head.

"Please?" Akaashi asked, knowing it was futile. Bokuto wasn't a singer, although he'd slow dance with Akaashi to his singing late at night.

"On a special occasion," Bokuto relented.

"Like, today?" Akaashi suggested. "Tomorrow?"

"No," Bokuto hesitated, tucking a lock of hair behind Akaashi's head. "At our wedding."

Akaashi took a sharp breath. He had never imagined spending his life with anyone else, but he and Bokuto had never talked about tying the knot before.

"Sorry," Bokuto mumbled, a tint of pink on his cheeks."Was that too much?"

"No no," Akaashi kissed Bokuto's cheek. He'd gladly spend the rest of his life with this man. "Sing for me at our wedding."


	2. The first and final part

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> prepare for the feels.
> 
> PLS READ! if you'd like all the tw's and warnings that will occur in this chapter and onwards please go to the bottom notes, and then you can decide if you'd still like to read it. also, tags. thank you.

"Bokuto-san," Akaashi brushed a hand over the lieutenant's shoulder, who was steadily, almost desperately, trying to get their pressurized oxygen tanks to run again. To keep circulating oxygen. "It's okay."

It wasn't okay. About two hours ago they'd commenced stage 3 of Project Comm, taking off from the navy base with the new system installed after going through the standard, thorough protocol. Bokuto had excitedly dubbed their small submarine "Fukuro", teaching Akaashi all the miscellaneous aquatic facts he knew. Spoiler, it was extensive.

They'd reached the checkpoint, 50 kilometres underwater after a little under 2 hours. The comms had gone out, as Kenma from tech had warned was a possibility, so Akaashi and Bokuto had started ascending to the surface.

But about twenty minutes in, Bokuto had noticed a little blinking red dot, signalling something was jammed with the pressurized tanks supplying their oxygen. Doing some mental math, Akaashi guessed they had forty, thirty minutes of oxygen left together.

And now, Bokuto was fiddling with the cold metal controls, pressing the same few buttons over and over futility. The hull of their submarine groaned under the increasing water pressure. Their pressurized cylinders had halted maybe half an hour ago.

"Bokuto-san," Akaashi whispered. It was helpless. "Stop." Bokuto instantly turned around at Akaashi's breaking voice, scooping up the younger boy's face. Lines of worry and fear were patterned around Bokuto's eyes, but his eyes, his familiar eyes, were so steady. Akaashi reminded himself to breathe shallowly. Conserve the valuable oxygen.

"Let's check it one more time." Bokuto pressed his lips together in a thin line, a half-smile. Akaashi nodded and intertwined their fingers carefully. The two military recruits, one lieutenant and one soldier, walked to the back of Fukuro. Even though it was made for four to six people, it felt overwhelmingly too big and too small at the same time. Akaashi tightened his grip on Bokuto's hand, who squeezed back in return.

Bokuto flipped over the panel to the pressurized oxygen tanks, which should've been slowly releasing their oxygen, but instead were at a standstill. Just like the last dozen times that had checked. Bokuto swore, hitting the panel once with all the force Akaashi recalled from makeshift volleyball games at their base against Kuroo, another soldier, and Kenma.

Akaashi flinched, and Bokuto stilled.

"Sorry," he said, pressing his hand to his forehead.

"It's okay," Akaashi said again, pulling Bokuto's hand off his forehead and wrapping Bokuto into a hug. Breathing in his boyfriend and savouring his embrace. "I get it."

Seconds ticked by. Precious oxygen trickled away.

"Akaashi," Bokuto took a deep breath. Akaashi didn't like this tone, the listen to me even though it's something stupid tone. But it was serious.

"Akaashi, I'm really sorry for asking you to come on this mission for me." Bokuto held both of Akaashi's hands, shaking. "You shouldn't be here."

"Bokuto-san, I came because I wanted to. Don't apologize for something I decided to do." Akaashi fought to keep his voice steady. The reality of the situation was still pouring in.

"It's not fair though," Bokuto said, upset. "I'm sorry. I want to fix this."

"Don't blame yourself," Akaashi kissed Bokuto's cheek lightly. "I know you are and you're going to stop that right now." Akaashi gave Bokuto a solid, and what he hoped was reassuring, look.

"Least we know the comms don't work," Bokuto joked, an attempt at humour.

"Kenma will be so pissed." Akaashi smiled wryly.

"And Kuroo will be pissed that Kenma's pissed."

Akaashi nodded. The hull groaned again, and Bokuto tightened his grip on Akaashi's hands, almost painfully.

Bokuto trembled. His voice quickened. "There's enough oxygen for one of us to make it back to the surface."

Akaashi huffed into his boyfriend's chest. He knew that. Akaashi opened his mouth to speak when Bokuto pressed a finger over his lips, asking with his eyes for Akaashi to hear him out.

"I want to take an TX pill. It's my fault you're down here, and it's not fair if you die because of that." Bokuto held both Akaashi's hands, shaking. TX. A drug developed by the base, kept in every submarine and every plane as a suicide method. It supposedly set in after one minute, being painless. Better than death through oxygen deprivation.

Akaashi choked on a grim laugh. He'd be lying if he said he hadn't just considered volunteering to do the exact same thing.

"No," Akaashi said simply.

"But Akaashi," Bokuto fidgeted. "I don't want you to spend the rest of your life in a sad little tin box floating in an ocean. I want you to go to Rome and see those statues and eat the best pesto pasta and see Hamilton live and go on a rollercoaster with me-" Bokuto cut himself off.

Akaashi hadn't even thought about any of those things.

"Well," Akaashi sighed. "I want to spend the rest of my life with you." _Even if it's only twenty more minutes._

"What if I don't want that?" Bokuto asked with resolve. He started to pull away.

"It's my life and that's what I want," Akaashi said affirmatively.

"But one day you won't," Bokuto countered. "You'll meet someone grand who doesn't lead you to your death and I just-" Bokuto tore himself away from Akaashi's arms, painfully, and leaned over to get an TX pill from the little compartment, almost there, when Akaashi slapped him with the power of a spike. Pain seized his hand as the slap rang out in the empty submarine. A red mark instantly started forming on Bokuto's cheek.

"Bokuto-san, please," Akaashi fumed, trying not to kiss and kill Bokuto. "If you won't let me take one for you, you can't take one for me. So shut up."

Bokuto looked startled, and hand hovering over the slap mark.

Akaashi started, "Bokuto-san, you think I'd be okay with that? Don't make such a selfish decision. What's up there for me? Nothing compared to what's right here. You don't get to decide if the best thing in my life is taken away from me so I can maybe, and that's a bit maybe, live out the rest of a half-assed, regret-filled life. That's no guarantee I'll be saved and I don't want to live at the expense of your life. You wouldn't let me do that, well, it goes both ways. I love you too, Bokuto."

Bokuto was still shocked, and then he nodded dully. Akaashi knew Bokuto had spoken out of being impulsive and rash, but honestly. Suggesting to throw your life away so easily? God. Akaashi wanted to roll his eyes so hard at Bokuto that they fell out of their eye sockets. He'd already accepted death, and now Bokuto had to be heroic?

"Sometimes you are smart. This is not one of the times. You're being so stupid," Akaashi threw out there instead. Bokuto poked his side, a grin twitching for a second on Akaashi's face.

"I'm sorry," Bokuto looked ashamed. He shuffled. "I didn't think of it that way."

"I know," Akaashi sighed, trying to calm his rapid heartbeat. He ran a thumb over Bokuto's knuckles.

"We -," Bokuto headed back to the control panel. "We shouldn't talk." Oxygen would be wasted. With the amount of space in their submarine, Akaashi guessed they might have twenty minutes.

Akaashi nodded. Bokuto sat back down in front of the controls, now focussed on the communication panel. Static. Nothing but static from their base.

Bokuto intently fiddled with it longer, moments stretching out longer and longer. They were ascending slowly, straight up.

Akaashi, in the copilot seat, watched the vast ocean in front of them, their submarine a tiny dot in the void of nothingness. A speck, two people, cloaked in darkness and the ocean, alone in the middle of this universe that was still rapidly changing, despite the two small meteors of life, defenceless against the laws of nature, and as it seemed, fate. This was it. He choked suddenly.

"Kaashi?" Bokuto looked over at him, unsure.

_This was it._

He wasn't going to see Bokuto sing at their wedding, Bokuto when he was sick and sneezing to no end, Bokuto with natural grey hair settling in. Bokuto with crinkling smile lines, or walking their dog, or waking up to him in lay mornings and pressing a kiss to his cheek. And there would be no more shower sex, no more kisses as training bribes, no more laughs over whales and no more tickles. No more feelings, or smile, and no more memories.

And Akaashi was hit by the sheer amount of things they hadn't done together and would never do.

Akaashi felt tears dripped down his face. Small dollops of devastation, falling into the floor. Bokuto stood up and pulled Akaashi up by the arm, wrapping an arm around Akaashi's waist and thumbing away Akasshi's tears.

"Don't cry Kaashi," Bokuto pressed a kiss onto his mouth and Akaashi gasped. It was different. It was so simple, but so loving and haunting at the same moment. Akaashi kissed him back, trembling.

"Keiji." Akaashi requested softly. "Call me Keiji."

"Keiji," Bokuto whispered. He knew what Akaashi had been thinking.

"Bokuto-san-"

"Koutarou," Bokuto said firmly. "Goes both ways, right?"

"Okay," Akaashi swallowed. "Koutarou."

Bokuto thumbed another tear away. "Yes, love?"

 _Love_. Another tear fell from Akaashi's eyes. Akaashi buried his head into Bokuto's chest, wanting to scream at the universe for the complete unfairness.

"We - less painful - TX." Akaashi choked out. "We can take it in the end."

Bokuto tilted his head, and then nodded. "Okay Keiji." Akaashi's chest tightened at Bokuto saying his first name like that.

Bokuto pulled out two pills, two white pills from the side compartment of the submarine, and dropped them into two small cups from the makeshift kitchen.

"Let's take them at the last moment," Akaashi whispered. Bokuto nodded, leaving them on the counter.

"However," Bokuto grinned, a little too mischievous. Akaashi mustered a small smile back in between tears. "I still intend to sing to you at our wedding." 

Bokuto pulled away, grabbing the Voyage Data Recorder. The black box equivalent for submarines, that was already tracking their location and position, so maybe Kuroo or Kenma would be able to find something out.

Bokuto switched on the recorder, and set it on the floor.

“I’d like this on record.” Bokuto cleared his throat, suddenly professional. “This is Koutarou Bokuto, first lieutenant of the Miyagi Branch, Agent 4F1, recording the details of July 2nd, 2020,” he stated with pride, confidence. Akaashi watched him.

“I’m here as part of Project Comm, where we were testing the new communication systems in between submarines. Ours had gone down and the pressurized cylinders stopped working about an hour ago.” Bokuto’s voice caught once.

“Akaashi Keiji, soldier 5K9 and I went through the manual and attempted each possible solution to no avail. But,” Bokuto looked at Akaashi now, talking to him. Only him.

“I promised a certain somebody I’d sing for them at our wedding. I know this is very untraditional, and Kuroo will be pissed he didn’t get the cake, Kemna will hate us a little extra, and my parents will be mad they aren’t here, but-”

Bokuto took a big breath and slid to one knee properly. Holding out a small twine makeshift ring, made from the ship's emergency supplies.

“Akaashi Keiji, would you do me the honour of making me the happiest, and the luckiest man in the entire cosmos and world and whatever else we have yet to discover?”

Akaashi’s tears were blurring everything. Brimming over his eyes again.

“Will you marry me?”

Akaashi threw his arms around Bokuto, sobbing, full-on, feeling Bokuto support him with an _ooof_ , and stand up.

“Yes,” Akaashi gasped, a mess with his tears.

Bokuto cleared his throat. “I’m sorry it’s not fancy or at the beach like I know you’d like or full of presents or really good sushi, but um-”

Akaashi cut him off by pressing a hand against Bokuto’s mouth. His turn. He tried to still his hiccups, trying to remember all the vows. There was no time, Akaashi could sense the real lack of oxygen in the room, not just from this impromptu wedding.

“Do you,” Akaashi drew out his words slowly in between fading sobs. “Bokuto Koutarou, take Akaashi Keiji, to be your husband, to hold and to have for this day forwards, for better or for worse, for rich or for poor, in sickness and in health, to love and cherish,” Akaashi amended the next lines.

“Despite being dead or alive, in heaven or in hell, and to know that Akaashi Keiji is irreversibly and always in love with you?”

Bokuto nodded almost violently. “I do.”

“And does this Akaashi Keiji promise the same?” Bokuto asked after a beat, softly.

“I do,” he exhaled slowly. A tear dripped down Bokuto’s cheek, and Akaashi swiped it away.

“Then, by the power invested in me, and you, and all of the future things we’ll never get to do, I pronounce us,” Akaashi trembled. “Married.”

He watched shakily as Bokuto slipped the twine ring into his finger, admiring his hands. Bokuto gave him the other one, and Akaashi, shaking, pushed it into Bokuto's ring finger. There. Matching. Intertwined. The rough brown against his small hands, held by Bokuto’s strong ones. Akaashi wouldn’t want it any other way.

“You may now kiss me, Koutarou.”

Bokuto grinned, and they kissed. Kissed like they had all the time in the world, like they were standing in paradise, like everything was liquid and they were small, burning ashes never to go out.

Akaashi felt tears drag down his cheeks, and his now oxygen-deprived brain barely thinking straight as Bokuto mangled his hair, pulling him closer and closer and closer. Salty tears mixed with their kisses, and Akaashi realized Bokuto was crying too. Kissing him, and crying. They kissed, and kissed, and kissed until Akaashi was convinced they wouldn’t have to leave. They could kiss until they’d turn into statues, and stay at the bottom of the ocean, wrapped in each other’s arms together.

“Husband,” Bokuto said foreignly, Akaashi smiling at the sound. Bokuto’s lips and eyes were puffy, glowing, but puffy. “I love you.”

“I love you too.”

“I think - I’m sorry but I think - it’s time.”

It was time. Akaashi’s vision was blurring at the edges. His heart was faster than ever, straining to jump out of his chest. He pitched forward, Bokuto grabbing him around the arms.

“Sorry-” Akaashi gasped. Bokuto maneuvered them onto the floor so he was against the wall and Akaashi was sitting in his lap. “Sorry husband.”

“S’okay husband. One second.” Bokuto shifted a little, switching off the Voyage Data Recorder and grabbing the cups. Akaashi stared at the one dry, tiny white pill, and then at Bokuto’s golden, so alive eyes.

“Well,” Bokuto whispered dryly. ‘It’s not chocolate buttercream but it’ll have to do. Cheers.” Bokuto clicked their plastic cups together limply. Without warning, he tipped his head back and swallowed. Akaashi did the same, ignoring how dry it was. And how he was sealing his fate.

He felt his brain starting to hitch, but he grabbed Bokuto’s face and kissed his roughly, frantically, like he did when they were having sex, dancing behind the volleyball gym in high school, when they reunited during Christmas break a year ago. He kissed him for all the times he wouldn’t get to. Bokuto let him, hands in his hair. Akaashi’s head was spinning, thrumming, and he whimpered. Bokuto grabbed him tighter.

“It’s okay love,” Bokuto smiled. “We’re staying together. I promise.”

Akaashi nodded, faintly, his head lolling back onto Bokuto, who smiled down at him.

“I love you Kou,” Akaashi whispered, stars appearing.

“I love you Keiji.”

And Bokuto began to sing.

A low, melodic, breaking voice filled with the submarine. The tune Akaashi had rattled off the first time he’d sang in the library in high school, years and years ago. Akaashi hummed along under his breath, slipping in and out of consciousness. Bokuto held his hands, leaning into the smaller soldier, pressing them together as close as they could be. And when Akaashi stopped seeing stars, but still heard Bokuto’s voice, he knew it would be okay. As the two lovers drifted off into the next world, a haunting tune from the whales played for the newlyweds and their love.

After an hour or a century had passed, the submarine broke the surface peacefully. The tune from the whales had never stopped, rattling through space and time, radiating from the submarine. Playing for this love that transcended life and death, water and oxygen, common sense and the universe. Playing for the lovers, and their deaths. For everything they were, and all they never got to be.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> warnings: major character death(s)  
> tw: death, suicide, could be triggering if you have claustrophobia or a fear of drowning
> 
> \---
> 
> am i evil? yes. will i stop being evil? probably not. MWAHHAHAHHA.  
> seriously, what did you guys think? criticism? ideas? anything - go.  
> thank you for reading!
> 
> (also, okay. i wrote an epilogue about kuroo and kenma once they find the recorder, but I kind of like how it ends here. should i leave it like this or post the epilogue?)


	3. epilogue

When Kuroo and Kenma got the Voyage Data Recorder, they were both in an extremely pissed haze. Kenma was still reeling from the fact their best friends were dead, and the submarine had just been found, 2 hours after their disappearance. Floating on the surface, wrenched open to find Akaashi and Bokuto lying in each other's arms peacefully, intertwined even in death.

The general had finally given Kuroo and Kenma the slightly damaged recorder, saying they were mentioned after the high-fucking-ranking tech team confiscated and analyzed it. In a shaft hallway, Kenma pressed play defiantly. Kuroo looked like he was going to explode. Clenched fists and sharp, guillotine sharp glares. 

_ “-I’d like this on record.” _

Kuroo flinched at Bokuto's voice. It was so scratchy, fading in and out of static. Glitching and blurring words, a dull hum as white noise in the back making the words barely decipherable. Kenma was crying, he hated them so much right now, trying to focus on the recording without crying. He couldn’t, as he heard Bokuto outline the situation. Kenma hated them so much.

_ “I promised a certain somebody I’d sing for them at our wedding-.” _

_ “-the honour of making me the happiest, and the luckiest man in the entire cosmos and world and whatever else-” _

Kenma was crying.

_ “Will you marry me?” _

Kenma was crying. A lot. Tears dripped down Kuroo’s cheeks. 

_ “-you, Bokuto Koutarou,-” _

“- _ despite being dead or alive, in heaven or in hell, and to know that Akaashi Keiji is irreversibly and always in love with you?” _

_ “I do.”  _

_ “- this Akaashi Keiji promise the same?” _

_ “-do-.” _

_ “-invested in me, and you, and all of the future things we never got to do, I pronounce us married.” _

_ “-kiss me, Koutar-.” _

_ “Husband, I love you.” _

_ “- love you too.” _

_ “I think - I’m sorry but I think - it’s time.” _

Fuck. Kenma dropped his head into his lap. He dreaded the end of the recording inevitably coming.

_ “Sorry-”. _ Muffles again.  _ “Sorry husband. One seco-.” _

A beep, and then the box recording ended. Kuroo stood up, and then punched a clean hole through the wall. He was breathing loudly, still in denial. Kenma watched him through a lens, numb at the whole unbelievability of the situation.

“They kept the end to themselves,” Kenma remarked, empty. 

“As they should’ve.” Kuroo choked, raising another fist. Kenma stood up, cradling the box. 

“I’m sorry Akaashi, Bokuto,” Kenma whispered. He hoped they were together, singing and kissing and married in whatever came after death, because the world was wrong to cut these lives so short. But they would still live on, in this recording, of love and desperation and hope in all the wrong places, for all the right people. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> well i feel a little evil. whaddya guys think?


End file.
